by Jim Panyard
Constitution Party of Pennsylvania Vice-Chairman

Where are you going Lady Liberty? Where have you gone?

Sadly, most lovers of freedom and independence know the answer to those questions. They simply don’t know what to do about it.

Write a letter to your elected officials or the local paper? Educate your children about American ideals? Buy gold? Stock up on supplies? Oil your guns? Gripe to your barber? Make a sign and stand around sipping coffee at a protest rally? Hand out freedom literature? Vent on a radio talk show? Pray?

The last idea is always a good one. The others appear to be ineffective, at best, or delusional. The Status Quo is not changing for the better and the wheels of government grind larger each day, month and year.

When Homeland Security Czarina Janet Napolitano recently issued a national warning describing veterans, supporters of third political parties and other traditional conservatives as potential domestic terrorists. She was probably closer to the truth than anyone cares to admit. (Of course, one man’s “terrorist” is someone else’s “freedom fighter.”) The monarchy and its sycophants are beginning to sense the, as of yet, unchanneled outrage of an unknown portion of America’s serfs.

If Obamians, those in the U.S. Houses of Lords and Commons, their handpicked judiciary, their court jesters in the media and the bureaucratic parasites that fill Washington and the outposts of the American Empire daily, have any sense of self preservation, they will tear down the barriers to successful Third Party efforts.

The two options for reversing the fascist/socialist drift of the comatose American Dream are politics and armed revolution. It’s really that simple.

No relief for the citizenry has been or will be offered to freedom lovers by the Imperial Presidency or the Demopublican and Republicrat charlatans who fill the seats in Congress, governor’s chairs and state legislatures around the country. In fact, it is clear, to all but the most obtuse, there is “not a dime’s worth of difference” between Republicans and Democrats, to quote the late Alabama Gov. George Corley Wallace. When Wallace said that, in 1968, the dime was considerably more valuable than it is today.

The system is broken and twisted, perhaps beyond repair. Certainly, millions of political lemmings come out every four years to vote for a new master and continue to return their Republican and Democrat congressmen, every other year, despite admitting in continuing national polls they prefer used car dealers to the U.S. Congress as a hole (whole?).

Third parties – Constitution, Libertarian, or Independent – could offer at least a temporary relief valve to release the pressure building in the national boiling pot caused by fiat money, constitutional violations, interventionism, politically manipulated “free trade”, blatant socialism and government corruption and theft.

Disaffected or recovering Republicans are jumping the GOP ship in significant numbers. In fact, as of this writing, only 21 percent of Americans will publicly identify themselves as Republicans. Whether those who have escaped the GOP will join a Third Party or simply fume at home is an open question.

If – and a mighty big IF – The Constitution Party could wrest hold of a dozen seats in the U.S. House or a few in the U.S. Senate or a dozen seats in each of a dozen state legislatures, it would have enough weight to slow down the Leviathan State and offer plausible alternatives to the fascism and socialism masquerading as an “indivisible” Republic.

Why hasn’t the party won? The reasons are many, but the foremost is M-O-N-E-Y. There are no wealthy special interest groups or individuals willing to pour millions into a political organization bound by principle. Most major corporations and wealthy individuals, even if they believe in the tenets of the U.S. Constitution, are afraid of offending existing government regulators and public officials.

The so-called “news media” ignores Third Party candidacies because of their own self-fulfilling prophecies that Third Parties have no chance of winning, so why cover them? If Congressman Ron Paul (R-Texas) had run as a Libertarian in 2008, he would have had no more success than he did in his 1988 Libertarian Presidential bid. But, as a Republican getting six to eight percent of the primary votes, the media was forced to cover him.

The media is too uneducated and lazy to understand economics, the U.S. Constitution, privatization and other critical issues. They are also, by and large, socialists at heart.

State election laws also make it difficult for Third Parties to get on the election ballots across the country by placing nearly insurmountable bureaucratic barriers in place for all but Democrats and Republicans. Self preservation is the forte of Democrat and Republican alike.

Some viable freedom-type candidates also avoid The Constitution Party because they do not believe they can be elected on other than a Republican or, rarely, a Democrat ticket. This, of course, raises the question as to whether the candidate would rather be right or be elected. If he or she would rather be elected, it is likely his or her principles are “flexible.”

Third parties are most inflexible in their principles and actually believe their platforms, unlike the Ruling Elite who use positions to dupe the electorate and then, once elected, do as they please. The “booboise”, as H.L. Mencken dubbed America’s voters, are always ready to disagree with a single point in the Constitution Party platform, but pay no attention to the vast inconsistencies of His Excellency and the Lords and Ladies of Sodom on the Potomac.

Third parties are, in fact, so principle driven their members waste inordinate amounts of time arguing over issues akin to, “How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?” This is a pattern that discourages actual advancement of the cause of liberty. Conversely, from the point of view of the Ruling Class, it is better to have them arguing among themselves than to have them shooting.

Despite all the nitpicking, however, Third Party members are at least still talking and debating. The scary part, for some, will come when dissenter debate is silenced either by the government or the acknowledgement by dissidents that the Powers-That-Be couldn’t care less about their thoughts, values and principles.

If traditionalist and hard working Americans ever lose hope and faith in “The System”, along with their homes, jobs, liberty and savings, a fuse will have been lit. The Ruling Class knows that, thus the continued charades, counterfeiting, jack-booted thugs in government uniforms, continuing “false flag” crises and anything else to get the masses’ minds off reality.

The Constitution Party plans to continue its struggle in the political arena as long as hope remains for the restoration of the American Republic. Recovering Republicans who have seen the light will join the effort.

(Jim Panyard is vice chairman of the Constitution Party of Pennsylvania and a member of the national party’s Executive Committee. He lives in Palmyra, PA)